In the early seventies our inventor, Paul Dards, formed a business in the world of In-Car Entertainment. The company specialised in the sales, repair and maintenance of car audio equipment and, over the following 20 years, became one of the largest and most successful in the country, with retail outlets in Luton and Milton Keynes and a trade repair business for other specialists throughout the South of England.

However, in 1992, their business was burgled a total of seven times in eight months. Paul knew he had to find a solution, and so SmokeCloak was born. There was no thought of a commercial opportunity – this was survival. The concept of artificial fog was initiated by memories of London fogs and the message from the police that it was not possible to stop a determined thief – only to slow him down. What could be a better way than a really thick artificial fog?

The first prototype was produced in 1992, with clouds of smoke emanating from his buildings at regular intervals as he tested/demonstrated his “baby”. What was even more astonishing was that the burglaries stopped, never to be repeated. The ‘fog’ was so thick that visibility was reduced to less than arm’s length in a matter of seconds. The jungle telegraph had worked and Dards Electronics had become a “no-go” area for the villain!

The SmokeCloak product was launched in 1993 and produced an amazing media reaction – newspapers, radio and TV all featured this eccentric new idea. It has taken a huge amount of money, work, travel and marketing to take the product to where it is today – sold in over 50 countries. Attention was paid to the safety aspects, to prevent unwanted activations during both day and night. Protecting all types of environments from banks to military stores, police stations to schools, shops to offices, houses to castles, and the first electronic security device to obtain police approval. SmokeCloak is now specified by insurance companies and is safely preventing millions of pounds’ worth of losses every single day.